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No Chardonnay in Aisle 3

By Eric Asimov March 30, 2009 12:37 pmMarch 30, 2009 12:37 pm

Politics as usual in New York State: The proposal to permit groceries in New York to sell wine, as is permitted in 35 other states, died quietly in secretive budget negotiations over the weekend between state legislators and Gov. David A. Paterson, according to Danny Hakim, the Times’s Albany bureau chief.

While the deal includes grants to a museum of brickmaking, a soccer hall of fame and the Urban Yoga Foundation, wine lovers will have little to look forward to, except increased taxes on wine and beer. If you have the stomach for it, you can follow a post-mortem of the proposal over at the Robert Parker website.

I have a home near Jameport Vineyards out on the North Fork. I’ve always enjoyed their wines, but I just read a quote from the owner where he basically gloats over the defeat of the legislation. It seems he favors liquor stores over consumers. I will never buy any of their wine again.

This plan would have ruined the local wineries, that is why so many of them have spoken out against it. Remember NY wineries buy NY grapes. Closing one third of the outlets that sell NY wine and replacing them with box store’s wine sections selling out of state bulk wine will have far reaching consequences. When you Uncork New York you preserve the jobs of more than just winery employees, you contribute to the employment of Vineyard workers, farm equipment people, farmers, fence post manufactures, etc. Good for the state legislators and Gov. David A. Paterson for choosing good Government over the wealthy box stores.

In his comment above, Ed Draves says that supermarket sales would have ruined local wineries. Gee, California allows supermarkets to sell wine. Do they have any successful local wineries out there?

Maybe the reason New York’s local wineries have so many problems selling wine off premises is because local groceries cannot sell local wine. Maybe the entire wine culture in New York would prosper if wine were more readily available.

I can’t believe that so many people dismiss the interests of the liquor store owners out of hand.

I’m normally in favor of competition. However, this issue merits a look at how NY has treated liquor store owners, who are often small business owners, squeaking out a profit. Each store much have an in-store owner (of course, there are ways around this). Moreover, stores are not permitted to come together and collectively purchase items (a year or so ago some wine stores tried to do this and got SMACKED with tens of thousands if not hundreds of thousands of dollars in fines). They can’t even sell complementary items like wine gift bags (again – 10K fine recently), forget about selling a little cheese.

Now, NY wants to allow GIANT big box companies, of course w/o individual in-store owners to begin selling wine and use their HUGE buying power to undercut the prices of those who have been dutifully paying their taxes and licensing fees over the years.

Even if we allowed wine stores to sell some food and other related items AND purchase collectively, it still would not be enough. At that point, I’d say fine, give ’em 5-10 years to actually form collective purchasing groups before they have to face the power of Wal-MArt, Wegman’s, Tops, Costco, etc. Then MAYBE we have something that is borderline fair.

Sorry Ed. Please drop the propaganda. I’m from the North Fork. The bulk of sales come from the winery tasting room and local restaurants, not liquor stores. Many wineries were against this because the liquor stores engaged in terror tactics threatening to remove from their shelves any wine produced from a winery that supported a change in the law. The truth is you support a monopoly and like all monopolies the consumer gets hurt.

Your claim that 1/3 of all liquor stores would close is based on liquor store funded studies that are questionable at best. Moreover, in most liquor stores in this State you would be hard pressed to find more than a handful of New York wines and the owners of those stores do next to nothing to promote local wines. The entire industry benefits when a monopoly is broken. Again, look at California. Wineries and liquor stores co-exist with supermarkets that sell wine. Consumers have more choices, the wine culture grows and everyone benefits.

I agree with Lou D. above. Every grocery store chain has become the big box format with a bank, bakery, coffee shop, small book store, card store, florist and pharmacy on the premises. I see no reason to add wine seller to the list. When was the last time you saw a small pharmacy in your neighborhood. Allowing this initiative would’ve undermined small businesses and created more unemployment.